Friday, February 7, 2014

Charlotte's Writ Crit

"[Animals] are all beasts of burden, in a sense, made to carry some portion of our thoughts."– Henry David Thoreau, Walden

"Animals are good to think with."

– Clause-Levi Strauss, paraphrased translation from The Savage Man

"The cultural marginalisation of animals is, of course, a

more complex process than their physical marginalisation.

The animals of the mind cannot be so easily dispersed."

– John Berger, Why Look at Animals?

Continuing
a body of work that began near the end of last semester, Charlotte creates
assemblages of printed pelts on black paper coupled with flat, grey silhouettes
representing human characteristics, to create human-animal hybrid creatures. In
contrast to last semester’s work, the animals that took on human characteristics
are now absent from this arrangement, representing a darker shift in tone from
the more awkward, whimsical animal creatures we saw before.

The
conceptual use of the human-animal transformation, detailed more thoroughly in
Charlotte’s statement (attached), brings to mind Ovid’s
collection of myths Metamorphoses, as well as Kafka’s Gregor Samsa of TheMetamorphosis, who wakes to find himself transformed into a monsterous
insect-like vermin, later shunned by his family upon discovery. Using
Charlotte’s statement as an introduction to the work, I approached this series as
seeking to create an anology between the negative cultural associations of
mental illness and the societal implications of humans taking on untamed,
animalistic behavior.

Immediately
striking to the viewer is the stark visual quality of the inked animal pelts,
which act as a matrix in these monotype prints. Visually, these prints are aesthetically
pleasing to the viewer and are akin to a photorealistic medium like a
photocopy. Coupled with silhouettes that allow for anonymity amongst human
characteristics, this pairing creates a blunt contrast between the
photorealistic qualities of the fur and the flatness of the grey human-outlines.

The size of the work represents a curious mingling of human-animal scale, while
the animal characteristics are life-size, the transformation into human form
illustrates shrunken human limbs, contributing to the sense of a mutated
creature. Also successful within this body of work is the sense of movement conveyed
through the animal pelts themselves. The animated quality composed by Charlotte
at the press shows careful consideration for motion and depth.

The
significance of the muted palette of black and grey is not immediately apparent,
and at times feels like an arbitrary aesthetic choice. Although the use of grey
does helps differentiate from associations of traditional silhouette imagery,
exploration into expanding the color palette could benefit the progression of
the work.

Currently,
abrupt shifts between animal and human characteristics, which is made more
apparent by the aforementioned contrast between black paper that represents
animals, and the grey paper that represents humans, create discontinuity
conceptually from the idea of a human-animal hybrid. The work would benefit
from a smoother and more integrated transition between human and animal
characteristics to better convey the sense of a hybrid creature to the viewer.

The
arrangement as presented here in the studio is also conveying a sense tentative
uncertainty on part of the artist at this stage of the work. Although a small
mock-up previews the work within a larger exhibition space, this particular
arrangement shows a lack of interaction between the creatures. The metaphor for
mental illness is also not yet immediately apparent through the works at this
stage, and overall the work lacks specificity in this regard. Although a label
reading “sexual predator” hints at a tentative title for one creature, it could
be helpful to extend this practice to the rest of the work. This label is also
important because it helps reinforce arguments made in the artist’s statement,
and serves as an introduction to language from the animal kingdom being applied
to societal standards.